Grangemouth five take cycle route to Orkney Sevens

Grangemouth RFC members set off for Orkney Sevens

James Trimble

Five local rugby players cycled 330 miles to mark their club’s 25th straight year at the Orkney Sevens and raised £8000 in the process.

The team-mates from Grangemouth Stags RFC, Stephen Binnie, Craig Bird, Jim “Fritz” Forsyth, Tony “Bubba” Hayes and Davie McFarlane took on the challenge of cycling all the way to Kirkwall last week for the annual competition and a couple of them even had enough left in the tank to take to the pitch.

Tony said: “We left Grangemouth on Monday morning and arrived in Orkney on Friday afternoon. We thought we should do something special because it was the 25th year the club has been involved in the Orkney Sevens.

“Fritz has been to all 25 of them.”

The players decided to use their marathon five-day cycle to help raise cash for Grangemouth RFC youth development squad and for the Lymphoma Association, a charity which provides support for those affected by this form of cancer.

Weather conditons were kind to the fantastic five as they pedalled northward, stopping off in Blair Atholl, Inverness, Brora and Thurso.

Tony said: “It wasn’t bad, but we did have one day of hail storms.”

After their cycling exploits, Tony, Stephen and Davie took to the rugby field for the Orkney Sevens, but did not get much sympathy from opposing players.

“We were pretty tired and sore,” said Tony. “There were a few guys moaning about having just played some five-a-side football before the match. Then somebody said, what about these guys, they’ve just cycled over 300 miles.”